From 600+ conversations with the world’s leading thinkers.
We write for the same reason that we walk, talk, climb mountains or swim the oceans- because we can… We have some impulse within us that makes us want to explain ourselves to other human beings… That's why we paint, that's why we dare to love someone- because we have the impulse to explain who we are.
We are born creative and often seek to transform our surroundings to suit our existence. Everything around us constantly changes and so creative options for adapting to this change become the only guarantee we have for a meaningful existence.
To make a great movie, you cannot set out to make a great movie! Great films are authentic, they capture the zeitgeist of a time and place in an entertaining and engaging way. Great cinema becomes something that reflects the mood of the time.
Being creative is about being a collective. It's not something unique. Cirque is not a one man, or a one woman show. It's a collective. That's why we can nurture each other's creativity.
At WeWork, we believe creators are anyone that's pursuing their passions and contributing to a mission. You may be an artist who is working on an innovative new project, a freelance software engineer providing client services or a director of HR at a Fortune 500 company that's trying to build a dynamic work environment for employees – regardless of your company size, title or function, you are working towards creating meaning, intention and purpose within your life.
When I play, I try to embody the most primal state I can- that's when you're strongest, at your most powerful, intuitive and convincing. Too much information and analysis can actually get in the way of how you would naturally understand and feel your way through the structure of a long, complex piece of music.
I believe it's more fundamental: similar to the 'use it or lose it' principle that applies to muscles, our brains engage in a nightly routine that stimulates thoughts and ideas not typically relied upon during the day. This built-in process keeps our thinking adaptive and nimble, fostering divergent thoughts and offering an evolutionary advantage.
When the first real version of the game came to life on my screen—without any decorations, scoring, or anything, just the playing field and the pieces—I couldn't stop playing. I realized there was something truly magical about the game. But I could never have imagined what it would become; that was one of the biggest surprises.
Diamonds are a miracle of nature, they are millions of years old, they survived a hazardous journey to the earth's surface and the discovery of them is an exciting moment. To see the rough diamond and then watch it come to life on the polisher's wheel with incredible fire and scintillation is incredibly inspiring.
At one point, while working on the rotation routine, I was watching a piece rotate on the screen. It was then that the idea struck me—the game could be played in real-time. That was the very first important 'aha' moment for Tetris.
Song writing is about finding a vision that sets the mood and state for the work and process. Then you need to put in the time and the good vibes to achieve that vision.
Writer's block was only invented 100 years ago; the term didn't exist before that. Writer's block is simply a fear of bad writing, not an inability to write. Nobody gets talkers' block! Everyone can talk! Instead of calling it writer's block, we should say, 'I haven't done enough writing yet, so I feel blocked.'